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Microsoft's C++/CLI Spec Has an Identity Crisis
Andy Updegrove writes "Microsoft's submission of its XML Reference Schema to Ecma has gotten lots of attention in recent months, because Microsoft offered it to Ecma to try to neutralize Massachusetts' adoption of the OpenDocument Format (ODF) standard. But last week it's earlier submission of C++/CLI to Ecma was in the limelight when the U.K. representatives to ISO cried foul over (of all things) its name, which they said was confusingly, and inappropriately, similar to C++. Some think that there may be more afoot, including the potential for Microsoft to add proprietary extensions after ISO finally adopts the new standard under a different name. Either way, the C++/CLI experience represents an interesting dry run for what to expect as Microsoft pushes the XML Reference Schema throught the same process."
(And some opinions too; I'll leave you to work out which are facts and which are opinions.)
It's the UK's panel that has submitted this paper to ISO; the UK panel is part of BSI, the British Standards Institute, one of the NB's (National Bodies) making up ISO.
The biggest problem is that ISO should not publish two standards which are for such different languages with such similar names, and encourage the confusion. Standards are there to reduce confusion, not to contribute to it.
And make no mistake, C++/CLI is a huge departure from the core language. It introduces a whole new type of pointer, it adds generics to C++ templates, it abandons const-correctness for core using "ref" classes, it has yet another string type (this time somewhat integrated into the language rather than being a pure library entity), it adds mandatory garbage collection (C++ has always permitted, but not required, GC, though with some caveats) in a way not consistent with previous work with GC in C++, and there's more I'm sure.
It's also a concern that C++ may wish to expand into areas overlapping with those that are covered by Microsoft's language "C++/CLI", and may not wish to do so in the same way as C++/CLI, which is mostly just one of a pile of vendor-specific extensions to C++.
ISO is about standardizing existing practice. Some of the biggest problems with existing C++ and C standards has been when they got too inventive, and accepted into the standards things that were implemented in few (or no) compilers. So far as I know, there's still only one compiler that supports C++/CLI (though I've a feeling one other company is working on one).
Microsoft and the ISO C++ groups have been getting along a lot better in the last few years; Microsoft returned to attending committee meetings, and hired some great people, both names that get publicity and some that don't. However, Microsoft is still a large company with a monopoly in certain areas, and some history of anticompetitive practices, and it seems sensible for us to tread carefully.
Stroustrup's comment. Apparently Microsoft is revising their documentation to clear up the confusion.